


Nothing to Say

by Jazoriah



Series: Life at Abel [1]
Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: Abel is a family, F/M, Female Runner Five, Mute Runner Five
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-08
Updated: 2016-12-08
Packaged: 2018-09-07 07:21:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8788822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jazoriah/pseuds/Jazoriah
Summary: She didn't notice when her voice slipped away.





	

When it first starts she does not even notice.

It is an easy thing to miss. The world has been consumed in an uproar, deafening and blazing in the wake of the outbreak, and when the dust finally settles what is left of Britain is blanketed in quiet.

One lone survivor makes her way from house to car to bush to outhouse, staying ahead of the walking nightmares through sheer inertia, and there is no one to speak to. No companions to comfort, no enemies to draw her screams. The dead are attracted to sound, so she holds her voice trapped, and no living come to demand she speak so she just… doesn’t.

All her life she had been talkative, obnoxiously so. Some found it entertaining, others were ready to staple her lips shut, but all knew it was simply who she was.

The last remnant of that life died on the end of a chair leg torn from her cheap dining set. She may have spoken at the time, she is sure she must have cried, but in the weeks since then she has embraced the purveying silence like a warm bath, submerged where she could not sense the world as it had been. From shelter to shelter she flees, and breathes, and rigidly waits in the silence to be found. To be eaten.

When she does come across other survivors she keeps moving, trying to stay out of sight. The world has been swallowed in chaos and with it has gone all trust between neighbours. You move, you scavenge, and you stay alive. Strangers might help or they might strip you of all you have and leave you to the hoards. You want to survive this thing? You must either be ruthless or very, very lucky.

She has little faith in luck these days.

As the landscape changes and she comes closer to the military base, she finds it is impossible to avoid everyone. Huddled pockets of refugees stalk towards the hope of safety, and as they converge they find themselves aligned in their desperation. Families warily keep watch through the night while angry men and women with improvised weapons beat back any approaching undead. In this strange union she finds protection, and perhaps the offer of something more, but an arched brow and blank eyes are enough to drive away any attempts at conversation. There is no reason for them to push. Why bother? They don’t know her. Perhaps she’s always been quiet.

One month into her stay at Mullins base she finds herself in a comfortable rhythm. She goes where she is told, performs her chores as directed, and runs when the simmering pool of anxiety threatens to spill up her throat. The cursory form they had shoved into her face on her first day holds her name, and some of her story, but no one has brought it up since. 

Every now and then, one of her fellow residents tries to strike up conversation. She ignores them. She isn’t in the mood.

It is not until her third mission as Mullins’s newest runner that she realises that something is wrong. Her fellow runner is moving through the trees, and is not looking at the branches above. He does not see the twisting zombie caught overhead, some poor soul who had tried to pull themselves out of reach, not realising they were already dead. He misses the wriggling corpse dislodge from its perch and plummet towards him. She lurches forward, peeling back her lips to scream a warning.

Nothing comes out.

She stumbles, confusion throwing her off, and manages to plough into the other runner just as the zom falls into reaching distance. It hits her instead, driving her to the ground and knocking the air from her lungs. Before it can get teeth or nails into her, the other runner has drawn his axe and swept the blade into its ribcage, throwing it off her. She scrambles away, letting him finish the job, and when he is done he offers her a weary smile.

“Thanks,” he says, and she forces her lips to twitch upward in acknowledgement. He helps her to her feet before turning away to continue their run, keeping a wary eye both above and below.

She takes a moment to collect herself, a worried frown settling on her brow. Watching the runner’s retreating back, she tries to call to him. Air huffs from her lungs but the words do not come. She takes a deep breath, tries to force her vocal cords to make a noise, but it is as though the muscles there aren’t connected to the rest of her. She readies her words, and somewhere between her brain and her throat the message is lost.

Shaking, she touches a delicate finger to the column of her neck. There is no pain. She is not feeling her usual distaste for conversation. There is no reason for her not to speak, yet her lips open and nothing happens. She cannot even bring herself to whisper.

Ahead, the runner realises he is alone and turns back, alarmed. He shouts, asking if she is hurt, and she shakes her head automatically, kicking her feet into gear. He watches her for a moment, then turns to continue, apparently satisfied.

That is when she first realises that her voice is gone. She wonders when she lost it.

Some weeks later she is approached by one of the higher ups. A different refuge in the countryside is in need of a runner, and she has proven herself competent and reliable. She considers for barely a moment before nodding her assent. It hardly matters where she is.

The chopper pilot is perky and welcoming, nattering away without expecting an answer. Strapped into the passenger seat and staring idly down at the passing scenery, she finds it oddly comforting. The chatter reminds her of a time before rotting corpses and limited rations, and so far above the trees and fields she feels untethered, light and free. She had always loved flying.

What a fucking disaster.

The pilot is dead, the chopper is down, she is bleeding, lost, dizzy, sick. She blinks, trying to settle her swimming vision. The trees look broken. The ground is torn. Where is the path? Where is the township? Where the hell is she supposed to run?

Her headset buzzes back to life and she hears a voice calling to her, pleading with her. She gulps a deep breath, forcing herself to hold it until her lungs feel a little more under control, and listens to what the man says. He is nervous, fumbling a little as he guides her in, and she latches onto his voice like a lighthouse in the dark.

The man gives her a new name. Well, technically a number but it feels like more than that. She trudges forward, listening to his chatter, and it seems like it might actually be compulsive. He doesn’t hear any reply from her but happily keeps talking anyway, drawing her in to her new home.

It does not take long for her new host, Janine, to twig onto what no one in Mullins had thought to question.

“They didn’t tell me you were mute,” she says, eyeing Five with a carefully blank expression. Five cringes, very aware of how close she is to being shot as an imposter, but can only shrug. One of the Abel residents hurries over with a pen and a notebook, and she scribbles,

_I don’t think they knew._

Janine arches an eyebrow.

“They never noticed you can’t speak?”

 _They never needed me to_.

Janine is silent at this, studying her new runner intensely.

“Very well. We will have to work around it. Report to Runner Seven in the morning. He will take you through your duties here.”

It is the most involved conversation she has had since the outbreak, and she finds her stomach pulsing with a mixture of unease and elation. A shudder runs through her back and shoulders, and she nods, a little relieved to be dismissed.

If she is under any illusion that Janine had simply accepted her story, that is quickly dispelled upon meeting Runner Eight. The woman is a powerhouse, only about an inch taller than Five but with a presence that owns every room she steps into and a voice that demands you mark every word. It takes a few weeks for Sara to catch her alone and scare the living bejeezus out of her. Threats are all very well and good but Sara makes it sound like Five has stepped on a landmine and any false move will blow her to cinders.

Five does not answer. Even if she could speak, Sara isn’t wrong. She wouldn’t trust herself either.

It’s almost jarring when they find her ID badge and her honesty is proven, because Eight suddenly flips from looming golem to stalwart protector with some serious mum-habits. That Sunday she shoves a plate of fluffy pancakes under Five’s nose and plants herself next to her in the dining hall as if the place has been reserved for her.

“Eat up, Five,” she chides as Five looks from the plate to her in surprise. “You’re fast, and a quick thinker in a pinch, but you need endurance if you’re going to survive out there. I’m not losing our newest runner to a dizzy spell.”

“I’d listen to her, Five,” chips in Sam from the next table over. “She’ll keep you pinned there til it’s all gone.”

“If you remembered to take care of yourself, I wouldn’t have to,” Eight tosses over her shoulder, not taking her eyes from Five. She leans forward conspiratorially, but does not bother to lower her voice. “That one would glue himself to the comms desk if he could. I once saw him stay up for fifty hours when a mission went pear-shaped.”

“They made it back,” says Sam, as if that resolved the matter.

“You collapsed in a field and were nearly mown down by a tractor.”

“Details.” He waves a hand like he’s swatting a particularly irritating fly.

Five snorts quietly, and both sets of eyes zone in on her. She catches Sam’s eye, and his grin is blinding, but he does not seem to expect any real reply from her. It is… comforting.

Sara smirks and gives Five a soft whack on the back of her head.

“Eat,” she demands, and Five takes a bite.

If she could have moaned in pleasure she would.

It is two weeks later that a different runner approaches her on the training field. Jody has been here longer, but is still finding her sea legs, not quite able to keep the panic under control all the time. Still, she has a nice smile and a sharp wit, and she approaches Five like an old friend.

“Here,” she says, thrusting a bag towards Five. “Went through a village on my last run, and their bookshop was still in tact.”

Curious, Five reaches into the bag and pulls out a heavy blue book entitled _British Sign Language: Dictionary and Syntax Guide_.

She blinks in shock, and looks up to Jody.

“It’s gotta be better than tapping codes on your headset,” says Four with a shrug. “You’ll be able to say more, and talk without your audio equipment.”

Five frowns and opens the book, flipping through the masses of diagrams and trying to think how she could make this work.

“We’re gonna try and meet up every night after dinner to learn a few signs and practice,” continues Jody, offhand. Five’s eyes snap back to her in shock, but she does not seem to notice. “All the runners who aren’t on duty, Dr Myers and Janine when she can. Sam, obviously. I can’t believe we didn’t think of it before. I spend so much of my time trying to be sneaky and I never bothered to learn silent signals.” She rolls her eyes and finally seems to catch sight of Five’s expression. “What?”

Five is barely breathing, face rigid and eyes starting to mist over. She clutches the book to her chest and nods, looking at the grass by Jody’s feet until the runner takes the hint and walks away. Trembling a little, Five holds the book up to her face and the tiniest of hopeful smiles starts to tug at her lips.

This place - these people - she isn’t sure they realise what they’re giving her.

The Abel residents are as good as their word. Every night a small group gathers by Janine’s farmhouse and fumbles their way through a range of handy signs, looking closely for any that might be useful in the field. They quickly become excited over the idea of name signs, and come up with a deluge of words for each other, throwing up a sign and laughing hysterically while the person they named frantically flicks through the book to find what it means.

In the end it all comes down to Five, though. Amid the laughter and the clumsy gestures that seem to turn into pinches and thumps bizarrely often, they keep an eye on the only truly silent member, and when she finally settles on a gesture, her word is law.

Thus Janine becomes ‘captain’, Sara is ‘cannon’ and Jody is ‘courage’. Simon throws out a slew of suggestions, including ‘handsome’, ‘strong’, ‘hot’, and ’champion’, before finally eschewing all subtlety and simply signing ‘sex’.

Five throws her head back and gives a long, silent groan, deeply regretting her inability to tell him to shut the hell up. She makes a loose fist and jerks it back an forth, glaring at him meaningfully, and Jody laughs so hard she crashes her head back against the wall. Simon protests in a tragically wounded voice, but despite Five finally caving and giving him a real sign, no one ever does seem to remember anything but the first.

When it comes to Sam, the group has lots of ideas. Janine suggests ‘guide’, but Sara argues that ‘puppy’ is more fitting. Simon asks if there is a sign for ‘guardian angel’ and Sam sputters that ‘dork’ would fit him much better. Five watches with a slight frown, pulling the book towards her and flipping through to find the word she wants. When she does, she looks up expectantly and the chatter quickly dies down as they await her verdict.

With a solemn expression, she lifts her right hand and crosses her index and middle finger, curling the rest towards her palm.

The group is silent, until Sam tentatively says “uh… okay. Cool.”

Jody crawls forward to peek over Five’s shoulder, and lets out a breath.

“Oh, yeah. That is perfect.”

Simon and Janine crane their heads forward.

“What is it?” demand Simon. “What does it mean?”

Jody looks at Five, who feels her cheeks heating a little, but Jody simply smiles warmly and bumps her shoulder against hers, before turning to give Sam a look of genuine admiration.

“Hope.”

For a long, quiet moment, no one says anything. Sam blinks, his mouth open a little, and the distant sounds of farm work drift into the small area. Squaring himself, he manages to stammer, 

“O-oh…”

Five looks at him, face full of determined sincerity, and gives a sharp nod. Sara’s gaze shifts from Five to Sam, and her expression slowly morphs into one of soft pride.

“Of course.”

Simon nods. Chris hums thoughtfully. All the runners murmur their agreement.

“That works.”

“Totally.”

“Nothing’s gonna top that.”

Janine purses her lips, scrutinising him from where she sat against the wall. Sam watches her, a little tense.

“Yes,” she finally says in a soft voice. “I agree.”

Sam has, by this point, darkened by several shades, and the people around him are not bothering to hide their giggles. Ostensibly to throw off his own embarrassment he reaches forward to grab the book from Five.

“What about you then?” he asks as he heads back to his seat.

Five tilts her head curiously and shrugs. She gestures around the group and then taps her throat with two fingers.

Sam rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I _know_ we can just say it out loud, but what if we want to sign to each other? Besides, you’re a part of this.”

Five acknowledges that and bites her lip as a dozen pairs of eyes lock onto her in thought.

“Is there a sign for ball-breaker?” Simon asks obnoxiously, and Sara smacks him on the back of the head. Five flips him off without looking at him.

Jody laughs, but quickly returns to business. “What about cheetah? I’ve seen you on roughnecks missions.”

“Surprise,” says Sara. “Since nothing you do goes quite as planned.”

“Explosion,” chimes in Ed. 

“Oooooh, yeah!” agrees Jody. “Or, like, demon. ‘Cause you fell from the sky like Lucifer.”

Five grimaces and Jody quickly back pedals.

“Ah, right… not that then.”

“That one,” Sam cuts in quietly, pointing to a sign on the page. Conversation ceases. Everyone turns to him as Simon looks over his shoulder.

“Really?” he asks, sounding disbelieving. “River? Why?”

Sam absently scratches at the skin behind his ear without looking up from the page.

“Because… well… you can’t hear it, even when the current is crazy strong. But it’s powerful and full of stuff you can’t see. And there are whole cities alive because of it.”

A beat passes while everyone processes this. Five stares, feeling the gazes of the her fellow residents settle on her. For once she is glad that she has no voice, because what the hell do you say to _that_?

“Well,” says Simon, letting out a soft chuckle. “ _Fuck_.”

“Yeah,” agrees Jody.

“That’s…” begins Chris.

“Damn,” says Ed.

Sara simply nods, and leans over to clap Five on the shoulder.

“River it is, if that works for you, boss.”

Five blinks at her in incredulity, then takes in all the people watching her expectantly.

Every face wears some kind of grin, from Simon’s salacious smirk to Janine’s approving curl at the corner of her mouth. Sam is looking at her with the same You-Will-Fucking-Take-This-Compliment-Or-So-Help-Me-God face that she had shot at him only a moment ago, and Five feels warmth rising from her stomach to her chest.

Months ago she lost her voice, because there was no one left to hear her. Now a room of people learn a new language so she can speak again.

One half of her mouth lifts up. She nods, signing a thank you. Conversation moves on and she tries not to be too obvious as she watches the rumpled radio operator get jostled by his family of runners. Sam is still looking rather pink, but his smile is relaxed now and he laughs as Sara ruffles his hair with motherly affection. Five leans back, idly resting her fingers against the column of her throat. 

She didn’t notice losing her voice when it happened, but she remembers the exact moment she got it back. 


End file.
